(NOTE TO REVIEWER(S): IF YOU NOTICE THAT THE DUELS DON'T TAKE PLACE IN THE RIGHT ORDER OR THAT THE 'WRONG' PERSON WINS, IT'S BECAUSE I HAD TO MAKE SOME ADJUSTMENTS TO THE ORIGINAL ANIME TO FIT IN MY OC'S STORY)

By the time she returned to Paradius, Deirdra was desperately in need of some alone time. Mai had blindsided her, unwittingly opening up old wounds. The breakup with Alister had been painful on both ends and it wasn't something she was eager to discuss with anyone, least of all Mai. She knew the other girl meant well, but she still didn't totally trust her. To be honest, she didn't totally trust anyone here. Dartz was affable enough, but who knew what evil motives might be lurking behind his smile. The same could be said for Valon. Raphael, for his part, seemed a shady character, and Rex and Weevil's track records spoke for themselves. They had no qualms about selling their friends down the river when it suited them and had done so on numerous occasions. And Deirdra wasn't even their friend. And as for Alister? He probably wanted to nail her to the wall almost as much as he did Seto Kaiba. No, she didn't trust any of them, and she certainly wasn't in the mood to be questioned or ordered around by any of them for the rest of today.

She decided this would be the perfect time to start building her new deck. No one was likely to bother her while she did that, and she needed to get a move on it anyway. She had already been informed by Raphael that she would be accompanying him to his duel with Yugi the next day to get a firsthand look at how the Orichalcos card worked. Plus, she'd heard through the grapevine that Dartz had a target in mind for her, though he had yet to reveal who it was.

After receiving directions from Valon, she reached the room where Dartz had compiled copies of every existing duel monsters card in the world, from the very first ones to the recently released. Her mouth fell open. There were thousands of cards. They filled display cases and lined the walls. It was an avid duelist's dream come true. Deirdra knew that it would take quite a while to build a solid deck with so many cards to choose from, but she didn't mind. It would be a pleasant distraction from her worries. So she plunged right in and got to work noting down cards she liked, trying out different combinations, developing themes, and making lists. Finally, she sat down and started selecting, discarding, and re-selecting cards, gradually weeding down her enormous pile to about 90 cards, give or take a few. When she had finished that, she made her final choices, using equal parts creativity and strategy, choosing both old favourites and unfamiliar cards. By the time she had reached the 40 card cut-off point, she felt satisfied that she had created a winning deck-literally.

Now came the arduous task of putting the rejects back in their proper places. She groaned inwardly. She could leave the cards as they were, but she didn't want to catch any heat from Dartz over it. As she slid off the stool, someone set a Dr. Pepper in front of her. She turned. There stood Alister. "I thought you could use a pick-me-up. You've been here for over 3 hours", he said nonchalantly. She noticed that he was avoiding having eye contact with her. "Someone's counting?", she asked. He smiled ever so slightly and said "Nothing escapes Dartz's notice. Stick around long enough and you'll find that out". Deirdra wasn't sure what to say, so instead she started gathering up the displaced cards. "Leave them", Alister said.

"Dartz won't care?"

"The only thing he cares about is you winning your upcoming duel."

"But-"

"Besides, we have other people to do that kind of stuff. Clean-up, I mean."

"How about that."

He gave her a funny look, then turned to leave. He stopped for a moment in the doorway though, and she sensed that he wanted to say something else. But he must have decided against it because he went off without another word. Deirdra smacked her forehead and let a bad word slip. She'd said the wrong thing. She hadn't meant to be sarcastic. Alister was just so darn confusing and she was wasn't sure how to act around him or WHAT to say. She got a lump in her throat whenever she saw him.